One of my favourite activities is sharing God’s Word with people. Tomorrow morning I’ll be leading a Bible study on Mark 6:31ff – where Jesus feeds the 5,000.
The Old Testament background to this passage is the Exodus – where God miraculously fed Israel manna from heaven, thus saving them and revealing Himself to be the Redeemer. In fact, He even tells the Israelites to keep a jar of manna to remind themselves of their redemption (Ex 16:32). Later, during the time of the prophets, Isaiah told them about a similar miraculous feeding that would take place at the ‘second’ Exodus.
Jesus, by feeding the 5,000 miraculously, shows us that He is the promised Redeemer - that He in fact, is God-in-human-form, the fulfillment of promises made to Israel thousands of years before. The Messiah who has come to save and rule.
The shock of the passage is that people, being hard-hearted, fail to recognise Him as the promised Redeemer. A problem, sadly, that continues today. Our culture continues to dismiss Jesus as simply a ‘good’ man and fails to recognise Him as the promised Redeemer (and future Judge).
What about you? Who do you think He is?
